New Way To Familiarize Autistic Children With Flying Gives Promise For Future Family Vacationing

Having a child living with autism presents all sorts of challenges that those without autism often will never fully understand. From having sensitivities to certain textures, to becoming overstimulated in most public situations; being an autistic family requires a lot of understanding of how the disorder works, no matter where your child falls on the spectrum. Even highly functioning children with Asperger’s cannot fly as it makes them suffer extreme anxiety, which further reiterates the importance of opportunities such as this to give them a sneak peek into a flying scenario.

As ABC 7 recently advised, flying can make anyone nervous or anxious, but when you live with a form of autism it can be debilitating just considering having to get on an upcoming flight. Having to stay seated for a long amount of time, to the fearfulness that comes with having to be in the air for long hours can bring on a massive panic attack for these children. That often turns into full on fits of screaming, crying, rocking, and so on in a very public airport that their parents have to endure all just to hop on an airplane and try to have a trip. It can be harder than you’ll ever comprehend if you aren’t aware of how autism works, which is why having compassion and understanding for families such as this just aiming to have a vacation like yours is just so necessary.

The “Open Sky for Autism” runs a few times per year, and is totally free to participants. You can find out more details here:

Since this particular program is ran in California, if you aren’t local to that state, you may be able to contact your local airport and ask for any types of tours they may offer to help transition families with special needs into the flying world.